IBM dual 1.4ghz PIII xServer 220 and 13 various PCs, many ?s

[aphetica]

Last week while I was taking out the trash, I found a beige box with a 1.7ghz AthlonXP and a 40gb drive in the dumpster. It had a fresh install of XP on it, and it's pretty quick. Faster than my old (main) PC, which was a measly 450mhz P3.

Later that day, I got a call from my dad who has been working at a waterpark, supervising construction... apparently their offices decided to upgrade and toss out a whole bunch of stuff that was in storage. Today he arrived at my apartment with 13 more PCs.

There are 4 older models, I think Pentium 1 or 486. They have ISA slots.

6 of the machines are Pentium 2 or 3... a few PCI graphics, sound, and ethernet cards in them.

1 is definitely a PIII with an AGP graphics card.

The last machine is an IBM xServer 220!

I have wanted a server forever and ever, especially one with dual processors and hot-swappable SCSI.

Only one processor is currently installed. It's a 1.4ghz PIII. I'm definitely going to get a second one. It has 3 hot swappable SCSI bays and one of them is populated by a 10,000rpm, 38gb drive. From what I can gather, it will handle up to 4gb of ram... it has 512mb of ECC installed currently.

Unfortunately, I have probably never even touched a server in my life, and I really know nothing about them. I powered it on and Windows server 2000 came up, but it's password protected. Apparently it's possible to find a way around that? I'm still looking into it.

I have some questions, if any of you would be so kind to help me out a bit...

First... if I add a second processor, do I have to match the speed of the currently installed one, or can I use a different speed? The current processor is a 1.4ghz Tualatin pentium socket 370. I happen to have a 1.3ghz tualatin celeron socket 370 available... would it be possible to use that?

Second... it's currently populated by PC133 ECC ram. Is ECC necessary? Will the smoke escape if I put non-ECC PC133 in there? Do I have to match the pairs?

Third... Can I use this thing for gaming if I drop a video card in it, or are they just made to serve files?

Fourth... there are these weird vertical cards near the processors that have a bunch of capacitors on them... it seems like there is one for each processor. What in the world are they?

Finally... do I have to run a sever-specific version of Windows on this machine? Can I install XP or Vista on it?

I apologize if any of this sounds dumb, but like I said, this is my first adventure in the world of servers.

 

[Lateralus]

1.4GHz Pentium III = Tualatin = Damn yummy

 

[drbalint]

First... if I add a second processor, do I have to match the speed of the currently installed one, or can I use a different speed? The current processor is a 1.4ghz Tualatin pentium socket 370. I happen to have a 1.3ghz tualatin celeron socket 370 available... would it be possible to use that?

The speed of the processors have to match and they have to be P3s, I don't beleive that celerons are officially supported in dual configs. Officially you are "supposed" to use the same stepping models, but I have found some systems where you don't have to.

Second... it's currently populated by PC133 ECC ram. Is ECC necessary? Will the smoke escape if I put non-ECC PC133 in there? Do I have to match the pairs?

ECC is not always required, however you can not mix them with non ecc in the same system. ECC is also pretty cheap now a days vs in the past. Pairs are dependent on the system's chipset. I would go to lenovo.com who now supports all ibm systems and servers and find the reference user manual.

Third... Can I use this thing for gaming if I drop a video card in it, or are they just made to serve files?

You could drop a card into it but most servers do not have agp slots for video, newer servers have pcix and pci express, but more then likely that server model has pci and maybe 64 bit pci slots. Either way you are limited to a pci graphic card, which as you may know probably the fastest card for pci is some geforce 5xxx or 6xxx series but still will be paltry compared to rigs of today.

Fourth... there are these weird vertical cards near the processors that have a bunch of capacitors on them... it seems like there is one for each processor. What in the world are they?

Those are called VRMs or voltage regulation modules.

Finally... do I have to run a sever-specific version of Windows on this machine? Can I install XP or Vista on it?

You can run XP pro or any version of windows software, most OS's support single and dual processors since the release of XP in 2001.

If you have any other questions I would be happy to help, I own almost 30 compaq-hp proliant servers. Proliant 5000, 5500,6000,7000, 8000, 8500, dl760, and many others. I love working on servers they are a passion of mine.

 

[aphetica]

Wow... thanks. That was quick.

I assume if I want to add a second PIII, I need to add a second VRM?

 

[drbalint]

Only if you don't see a VRM in all the available VRM sockets, for that system I believe there should be 2 but the ref guide should steer you accordingly.

On their website if you go to the support section, make sure you have the MN: xxxx-xxx (located on the small sticker on the front or back) available so you can easily navigate to the proper information.

 

[quinterro]

Unfortunately, I have probably never even touched a server in my life, and I really know nothing about them. I powered it on and Windows server 2000 came up, but it's password protected. Apparently it's possible to find a way around that? I'm still looking into it.

Since the other questions have been so well answered I'll answer this one. There is a ISO called Windows Rescue CD which is a customized Linux distribution that will allow you to edit/clear the passwords. If the user had encrypted files clearing the password will render them unusable.

The only drawback to it was that if the NTFS filesystem needed to be checked it would only allow you to view data on the drive and not change it.

I tried locating the one that I use but as of yet can't find it. I did find another CD that has similar capability:

http://trinityhome.org/Home/index.php?wpid=1&front_id=12

Clearing passwords has made repairing computers much quicker (don't have to ask what it is).

 

[Bunsen]

Linux or a BSD will make better use of a second CPU than Windows, from what I hear